


it's a wonder you're still alive

by JustBeforeTheDawn



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure & Romance, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Space, Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, Betty Cooper Needs a Hug, F/M, Ridiculous, i mean it's star wars you guys know what's going on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-13
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:47:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24690298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustBeforeTheDawn/pseuds/JustBeforeTheDawn
Summary: A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Betty and Jughead still somehow end up entangled.A not-particularly slow burn Bughead Star Wars AU
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones, Fangs Fogarty/Kevin Keller
Comments: 39
Kudos: 26





	1. holding her is dangerous

**Author's Note:**

> i'm back on my bullshit guys it's another sci-fi au
> 
> my favourite fictional couples that the writers felt like fucking over, together at last
> 
> (even if one of them is kinda… dated)
> 
> you know what the hardest part of this was finding roles for the adults to play because the rebels are all good guys, and damn! the parents suck so much. i ran out of good parents after fred and mary.

Betty’s hand trembles as she presses the disc into the R2 unit’s internal processor.

  
“Help me, Fred Erick,” she says gravely. “You’re my only hope.”

  
Her ship is at a standstill. Betty was virtually raised aboard her mother’s diplomatic corvette, and she can almost _feel_ the systems failing around her. The crew of Alderaanians are already captured; at least, she hopes so. Death would be a mercy, by comparison to spending time at His Imperial Majesty’s pleasure.

  
The rebel spies who’d given up their lives to get the Death Star plans – _Topaz, Blossom, she will never forget their names, she will make sure that everyone remembers their names as long as the Rebellion survives_ – sacrificed everything for this, and F8-NGS, her perpetual companion, will make sure that the plans reach the ancient Jedi, hidden in the desert.

  
Her mother spent years telling her of her time among the Jedi, in the dying, stagnating days of the Republic. It is hard not to romanticise the long-gone warrior-monks (?), with their conflicted philosophies and their strange abilities. It seems impossible that one should still live, making his life in the dunes of the desert planet sweltering below her.

  
But it’s too late to get home; and if anyone can get the plans to Alderaan, and then to the Rebellion, it is a Jedi.

  
“Fangs?” 

  
It’s her protocol droid, KEEV1N. He’s one of the only other beings that she trusts with this, and as eccentric and fussy as Kevin can be, she knows he and Fangs are counterparts, closer than friends, inextricably linked. Her heart thrums to learn that he’s still free too. The Empire treats droids horrifically, will wipe Kevin and Fangs’ personalities, work them until they malfunction, and send them to the scrapyard.

  
Fangs is already toddling towards the nearest escape pod.

  
“Fangs, where are you?” asks Kevin plaintively. “You know we’re not allowed in here!”

  
Betty ducks away from them. Their best chance is if she draws imperial attention. Hopefully, she can make sure that the Stormtroopers kill her before they realise who she is. She curses the long white robe of Alderaanian senators, the elaborate hairstyle that will give her away.

  
She clicks the safety off her blaster. It’s rarely used, but she knows how to use it. She must not think about the people who are under the Stormtrooper uniforms, the years of indoctrination and training that have led to unquestioning Imperial loyalty.

  
Unquestioning loyalty to one Imperial figure in particular.

  
She shudders, and prays again that she can trick them into killing her first.

The click of Stormtrooper boots reaches her ears.

  
“There’s one, set for stun!”

  
_Bastards,_ she thinks.

  
She takes two of them out before the familiar blue rings of a stun bolt hit her, and she slumps to the ground, unconscious.

In her dreams, she sees the future.

  
She’s never been sure if it’s the future or not, but she’s terrified of it. Precognition is one of the traits of the most powerful Jedi, but she was tested as a child. They would have found her, if she had the abilities, disappeared her like the other Force-strong children.

  
She remembers one of the boys from her little social group weeping one day, because his father was dead – concealing a Force-strong child is a capital offence – and his little brother was gone. His dad, when he came to pick Osren up, was a shadow of his former self, trembling and pale. Osren became withdrawn after that, rarely out of his dad’s sight.

  
She was a child, and while she knew it was a tragedy, she didn’t really comprehend it then.

  
As she grew older, as puberty and maturity and reality have shaped her life, she became more and more afraid. She’s never been sure that her dreams are really visions of the future, but now and then, she sees strange images that later sort themselves into some semblance of events that actually take shape.

  
She dreamt of her father’s illness, and not much later, a slow wasting sickness took him away.

She dreamt of fire, and a barren planet, and days later, the planet Geonosis was razed by Imperial forces.

But people dream stuff like that all the time, right? It’s usually just a coincidence. You dream something, real events occur, your mind conflates the two.

Betty’s not a Jedi. She just isn’t.

But she dreams, disjointed, uncomfortable images. She sees people she doesn’t know, sees a pair of hands reaching for hers that she longs for, although she can’t see the person that the hands belong to. That torn feeling she’s always had, like she’s missing something, calls to her. A black cowled figure looms over her.

She sees her mother with her hair in a long red mourning braid, sobbing over a picture of Betty.

_Mama_ , she says, _I’m here. Why are you crying for me?_

Light bursts into the palace of Alderaan, and then there’s nothing but blackness.

Betty wakes up, and tries to stretch.

“Ugh,” she says, feeling the cuffs around her wrists. “What the…”

Oh, no. She’s still aboard the Tantive IV, and they’ve captured her.

Her mind teems with information about the Rebellion. She doesn’t know everything, but it’s enough to compromise several of the cells, as well as the main base.

She was ready to die. Why couldn’t that Stormtrooper have just used a deadly shot? Since when did the Empire use stun blasts?

Well, they do when they’re as valuable as Betty.

“The Princess is awake,” drawls a voice, and the familiar faceless helmet of a Stormtrooper appears in front of her. “Come on, Rebel bitch. There’s someone who wants to talk to you.”

Betty stands, and straightens her shoulders, adjusting her cuffs into a calm handhold, as if she’s chosen this posture herself. She doesn’t owe them her fear. They haven’t broken her yet.

The Stormtroopers march her down the corridor. A black-masked figure waits there, towering over the Imperial troopers. All around him, Rebel corpses litter the floor. Betty’s heart sinks when she sees the body of Captain Keller. All of the other officers are dead.

It’s just her.

“Darth Vader,” she says, summoning bravery she doesn’t feel. “Only you could be so bold. You’re a monster! The Imperial Senate will not sit still for this. When they hear you’ve attacked a diplomatic-”

“Don’t act so surprised, Your Highness,” Vader interrupts, and it’s the distorted mechanical voice that haunts her dreams. “You weren’t on any mercy missions this time. Several transmissions were beamed to this ship by Rebel spies. I want to know what happened to the plans they sent you.”

He’s always sought her out in the Senate, forcing interactions with her where she wants none. It’s been a perpetual game of cat and mouse between them. He’s a genocidal maniac doing the work of a fascist dictator. She hates him, would bring him down in an instant if she could, and he delights in her powerlessness against him. He delights, too, in informing her of his successes against the Rebels, the atrocities he’s committed, the justification he feels for it.

He always knew she was a Rebel, and now he has proof.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says defiantly. “I’m a member of the Imperial senate on a diplomatic mission to Alderaan.”

“You are part of the Rebel Alliance, and a traitor. Take her away!” he snaps, and Betty is hauled off the last piece of Alderaan that she will ever see. The Stormtroopers’ grip on her arms is brutal, and she knows that her diplomatic bluster is fruitless.

She wishes she’d died with the rest of the crew. Vader’s mercies will only be cruelty, and before she dies, she may give away everything that she holds dear.

Betty’s lip trembles. The Princess Elizabeth will not cry in front of Imperials, while she can still show defiance.

Far below her, on the surface of Tatooine, Fangs and Kevin are bickering about which way to go. Many miles away from them, a red-headed moisture farmer wipes his eyes, and wonders when his life will begin.

Even further away, a dark-haired smuggler curses the day he ever got entangled with the Hutt’s Serpents.


	2. all the best freighter pilots are to be found here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jughead Jones, reluctant smuggler, makes some new acquaintances

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is called 'oh boy a star war au' on my computer

“Jones, you’re an idiot,” growls Sweet Pea. “If you keep pissing Peabody off, she’s gonna want your head on a laser spike.”

“I know, I know!” snaps Jughead. His hand is curled around the landing strut of the Millenium Falcon, and he rests his head against the cool metal of the ship. He never wanted to be a spice runner. He started out running supplies to the loose groups of rebels (not Rebels, not the organised, well-funded groups in the political and literal centre of the galaxy), making a name for himself among the blockade runners and spies lurking around Hutt space.

It went well, for a few years, and if he and the Falcon had to scrape by on minimal food and money, well, then, not much had changed. His years living half-raised on the streets of Corellia with an indifferent ex-Imperial father, and a mother who’d disappeared with his sister before he’d turned ten, had prepared him for hard times. If they weren’t on Corellia, they were smuggling halfway across the galaxy. 

At least running food and medicine to the battle zones, he’d felt like he had a purpose. When he’d saved Sweet Pea’s life, and the enormous Wookie had insisted on accompanying him, so much the better; Sweet Pea was hot-tempered, but in many ways more worldly and experienced than Jughead. Being a hundred cycles older probably helped, too, although Wookies perceived the length of time differently.

Sweet Pea gave him shit for his stupid decisions, and Jughead snapped back. It made a surprisingly good working partnership, and Jughead grew into his twenties thinking that life would be short, a little too exciting, but essentially okay.

Then they got caught by Penny Peabody, the leader of the Serpent Hutt cartel, one of the biggest and most vicious in the Outer Rim.

Peabody took great joy in telling Jughead that she was an old friend of his father’s, and took a possessive interest in him. He was a logical replacement for her od Imperial deal with FP Jr, she said, and if he didn’t agree, well, it was off to the Empire for both of them, which meant working in the spice mines of Kessel until they both died.

“I can’t go back there,” said Sweet Pea softly, while they were being held in the Hutt’s cells. “I’ll die first, Jughead.”

So they became spice runners, and Jughead descended into the same spiral of self-loathing that had driven FP out of the Empire, and into a life of smuggling on and off Corellia. At least he’d managed to keep his runs to spice, and nothing worse, like some of the more rare mineral goods, or sentients.

The Empire made no pretences to crushing the trade in live species anymore. If anything, they encouraged it, and the cartels grew fat on selling _people._

Sometimes, Jughead remembers that he wanted to be a writer, to join the Rebels for good, to bring down the Empire, but instead, he’s ended up here, stuck on Tattooine, running drugs for the fucking Hutts.

If he weren’t afraid it would make things worse for Sweet Pea, who’s just as stuck as he is, he’d consider driving the Falcon into the heart of the nearest sun, rather than run another cargo.

Instead, he heads into a familiar spacer bar, greets Hog-Eye with a surly wave, and settles into a corner booth with his hand wrapped around a glass of whiskey that he really doesn’t want.

Sweet Pea stays leaning at the bar, and Jughead narrows his eyes when he sees a strange old man, wrapped in dusty brown robes, approaching his Wookie companion. Maybe Sweet Pea can find them a commission, something that will earn them enough money to get Penny off their back for a while. One day, Jughead thinks, we’ll pay her back all of her stupid, imaginary debts, and she’ll let us go, and we can go back to our real lives.

He doesn’t know what his real life would be any more. 

Over at the bar, some idiot makes a commotion, and Jughead sees a red-headed figure go flying into a table. The kid is dressed in moisture farmer’s whites, and he’s sprawled on the floor like helplessly when-

A flash of blue streaks through the air, and suddenly the aggressive idiot is screaming in pain, his arm completely severed from his body.

The dusty-robed man is holding a lightsaber, dignified and calm in a relaxed, prepared stance. When the room settles into an uncomfortable silence, the man (bearded, middle-aged, kind face) retracted the blade, and turned to Chewie as if nothing had happened.

Jughead looks at the pair, and thinks, _trouble._

Once he would have gone looking for trouble like that, up for a fight against the world. Now he’s just tired.

Naturally, Sweet Pea chooses this point to bring the duo over to their table. Jughead leans back in an ostentatious display of unconcern that he doesn’t really feel.

“I’m Jughead Jones, Captain of the Millenium Falcon,” he says, without pre-amble. He gets tired of negotiations, and the old man looks wily. “If you’re talking to Sweet Pea, you’re looking for a ship.”

“Passage to Alderaan, bro!” blurts the boy, and Jughead conceals a smirk at how very green this guy is. The old man must have picked him right off the dirt, all shiny and excited for adventure.

“Yes, thank you, Archie,” says the old man calmly, and turns back to Jughead. “If it’s a fast ship.”

“Fast ship?” Jughead snorts. “You’ve never heard of the Millenium Falcon?”

“Should I have?”

Well, yeah, actually. Jughead doesn’t take pride in his work, but he’s come to enjoy their notoriety, the ludicrously embellished stories of his and Sweet Pea’s exploits that have sprung up across the galaxy in shitty bars like this. The one real truth of the stories is that the Falcon is very, very fast.

“It’s the ship that made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs,” he says, to test Archie, who looks mildly impressed. The old man just leans back, a slight smirk on his face. In all fairness, the Kessel Run is a complex trip, and it honestly is all about the _distance_ that you make it in, not time. Jughead’s gloated about that before, and he always gets three responses: awe from people who don’t understand that a parsec is a unit of distance, cynicism from people who do, and genuine admiration for people who understand how the stupid Kessel Run works.

The old man is clearly the second type; Jughead reckons Archie isn’t the third.

“I’ve outrun Imperial starships,” he says. “Not talking about the local bulk cruisers, I’m talking about the big Corellian ships. She’s fast enough for you, old man.”

Archie looks him up and down with wide brown eyes.

“What’s the cargo?”

“Only passengers,” says the man. “Myself, the boy, two droids – and no questions asked.”

Uh huh. Jughead knew they were trouble. Of course, they wouldn’t be asking a smuggler for passage if they weren’t mixed up in something.

Sweet Pea nudges him. They can’t afford to lose this fee, not after ditching their last cargo.

“What is it, some kind of local trouble?”

“Let’s just say we’d prefer to avoid any Imperial entanglements.”

“Well,” Jughead sighs, running his hands through his hair. “That’s the real trick, isn’t it? And it’s gonna cost you extra.”

How far can he push them?”

“Ten thousand,” he says, naming a stupidly high price to open. “All in advance.”

“Ten thousand?!” blurts the Archie kid, almost rising to his feet. “We could almost buy our own ship for that!”

“But who’s gonna fly it, kid, you?”

Archie’s enthusiasm rubs him up the wrong way, and he can’t help joshing him.

“You bet I could, I’m not such a bad pilot myself! Fred, we don’t have to sit here and listen to this-”

Fred puts a calming hand on Archie’s shoulder, and shoves him down with surprising strength.

“We can pay you two thousand now, Jughead,” he says, “Plus fifteen, once we reach Alderaan.”

“Seventeen, huh?”

It’s a ludicrous offer, but Fred seems bizarrely sincere.

“Okay, you guys got yourselves a ship. We’ll leave as soon as you’re ready. Docking Bay Ninety Four.”

“Ninety Four,” Fred repeats.

“Looks like someone’s beginning to take an interest in your handiwork.”

Jughead gestures past his new passengers, at the white-clad Stormtroopers now searching the bar. By the time the Stormtroopers make their way over to his table, though, it’s just him and Sweet Pea.

Jughead gives them a subtle nod. Stormtroopers never bother with disputes between Serpents, or any of the local crowd, and Jughead and Sweet Pea apparently count as part of the locals these days.

As soon as they’re gone, Jughead turns to Sweet Pea, and smacks him on the chest exultantly.

“Seventeen thousand!” he crows. “Those guys must really be desperate, this could get Penny off our backs for good! Get back to the ship, get it ready.”

He leaps to his feet, but as he makes to leave the bar, a familiar green-skinned figure appears.

“Going somewhere, Jones?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so currently this is very close to star wars canon, hopefully it'll be a bit more different soon 
> 
> I've got less time to be rude about the writers, sadly, because there's no canon going on atm - just an advance warning that it will almost certainly suck and none of us should be in this fandom
> 
> also i'm sorry for making archie luke. luke would NEVER.


	3. and now, your highness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Interrogations aboard the Death Star

Betty doesn’t know how long she’s been there.

It’s a deliberate tactic by the Imperial interrogators, of course; deliberately disorientate her, and remove her sense of time and place, in order to weaken her. She’s been trained for this; all of the high-level Rebel operatives have, and as an Imperial senator, Betty’s more valuable than most.

Just because she’s been trained, doesn’t mean it isn’t working.

They marched her off the Tantive IV, arms bound, through grey Imperial corridors to a holding cell. The stretched feeling of hyperspace lasted for – what, a few hours? – before they reached their destination. After that, they marched her down more, identical grey Imperial corridors, until they reached the cell she resides in now.

Her dress reeks. She’s been given very limited access to water to wash with, and she knows it’s another dehumanisation technique.

It is far from the worst thing that has happened to her.

She knows, intellectually, that this is probably the new battle station that the stolen plans were for. She hasn’t even seen the design, or the name of this installation; but the hangar she saw was immense, dwarfing the shuttle she’d been flown over in.

How many days has it been?

On the first day, the station commander – a short man she’d encountered in the Imperial Capital before now, Lodge – visited her in the cell.

“Princess Elizabeth,” he’d said. “You are very young; it’s easy to be fooled by the lure of the Rebels. We know that your mother has always had… sympathies, but there’s no reason that this should be the end of your life. Or even your career. The Empire is merciful, and loves its stray children. If you can tell me the location of the Rebel base, there is much that can be done for you.”

Vader loomed behind him, silent. 

Betty summoned all of the courage that she had. If she could address thousands of sneering Imperial senators, she can address the Grand Moff Lodge. This was the easiest stage of her incarceration.

“You are mistaken,” she said. “I am not a stray child. And I haven’t been fooled. The Empire is an illegitimate autocracy whose authority I do not recognise.”

“You were an Imperial senator,” said Lodge, surprised by Betty’s fervour.

“I was a Republic senator,” retorted Betty. “As flawed as the Republic was, it was not this open contempt for basic freedoms and sentient rights. It was an elected body. Your Emperor is a tyrant who colonises and brutalises the galaxy. I won’t tell you anything.”

Lodge stared at her, and a contemptuous smile started to spread over his face.

“You will be tortured.” His voice was calm, frank, slightly pleased. “Your rank and aristocratic privileges will not protect you here.”

“I wouldn’t expect them to,” Betty spat. “They’re the trappings of an outdated system. I’ve done nothing to deserve them. Torture me if you want; the Rebellion is more important than a single individual.”

Lodge smirked, and withdrew. Vader stayed there a few moments longer, staring at Betty, before he, too, swished his cape and left Betty alone in the cell.

Hours, days, some time later, Vader returned. Betty had found time to occupy herself in her cell; exercising in the limited space, making lists of all the mundane things that she loved in life, and meditating.

That time, he brought a torture droid. Betty was prepared for that too; for the loose, lost feeling of truth drugs, for the agony, the wealth of pain that the droid inflicted on her. The Rebellion’s anti-torture training for its most valued operatives was comprehensive.

Meditation was one of Betty’s least favourite activities when she was a child, and one of her favourites now. For the hours of isolation in the cell, Betty had meditation to clear her mind, to try to occupy herself.

When she was a very small child, her mother took her aside, and introduced her to a new tutor.

“ _She will teach you to control your thoughts, your feelings, baby_ ,” her mother whispered. “ _Pay attention, please. This is very important_.”

Her meditation tutors changed often. They all had the same sad, calm, exhausted demeanour, the same philosophies and strengths. A tiny, tiny bit of her wonders-worries if they were Jedi.

They wouldn’t be Jedi. Why would her mother risk that? The Jedi were hunted down and slaughtered.

Just now, she’s meditating, and her mind is still teeming with images, visions of things she’s never seen. A temple burns, where the Imperial palace now stands. The last Senators are leaving the Senate building, guarded by millions of Stormtroopers. The Senate, the last vestige of the old Republic, stands empty.

Her mother gazes into the poisonous green sky, where Alderaan’s skies should be blue.

A pair of gentle, calloused hands fold hers gently, and a kiss is pressed to her fingers.

Vader looks at her, and behind the mask are green eyes that match hers.

She opens her eyes, and Vader is in her cell. The echo of his breathing mask is intense, close, and she finds herself trying to breathe in tandem.

“You are remarkably resistant to the droid.” 

Vader’s voice barely registers interest.

“Few are resistant to the mind probe,” he says dryly, and his black-gloved hand grasps her shoulder just hard enough to show her a fraction of his strength. “You will not be. It would be better if you stopped resisting.”

Betty meets his gaze, as much as anyone can with that skull mask.

“I won’t,” she says calmly.

“You will.”

The first sensation is cold-hot tendrils reaching into her mind, like she can feel them worming their way in there. It can’t actually be a physical sensation, because the only grip Vader has on her is still on her shoulder; but it feels like something is physically invading her mind, creeping its way into all of her thoughts and her hopes and her dreams.

The tendrils _tighten,_ and every cell of Betty screams.

She isn’t physically screaming. Her mouth is barely open. She thinks she might be shaking, but she also might be completely still.

_Mom-_

The Queen, Mary, looks up at her, and opens her arms for a hug – but Vader is there, and he steps between them.

“The base, Your Highness,” he says, and Mary crumples behind him.

Betty remembers the first time she flew a speeder, the comfort of coordination and controls, the exhilaration of the wind in her hair. 

Vader is there, and he plucks her off the speeder with no effort.

“Your resistance is unsual, again,” he says, “but you will tell me the location of the Rebel base.”

Betty _wrenches_ herself out of his grip, and tumbles into darkness.

In her mind, she’s in her favourite hiding place in the palace at Aldera, tucked behind a statue of some illustrious ancestor, and some of the great plane trees that surround the central courtyard. Very few people could ever find her there.

_He’ll find you,_ her mind says helpfully. 

So she’ll keep running. There are a million good places in her memories where Vader can’t find her.

She transports herself to the most boring Senatorial committee meeting she’d ever attended, where the paperwork took hours and each speaker dragged their time out inexorably.

It will take Vader a long time to find her there. It could not be further removed from the Rebel base that she will not think about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there's so little leia for the first hour of the film? what the hell man? she's awesome!
> 
> although I guess it would mainly be her getting tortured and i'm p glad not to see that.
> 
> it's going to take a while for them to meet, so i'm sorry about that


	4. travelling through hyperspace ain't like dusting crops

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jughead finds himself in far deeper trouble than he'd anticipated

Jughead feels dirty all over.

It should be a side effect of Tattooine; the sand is coarse, and rough, and gets everywhere, but normally he doesn’t really hate that. No, it’s the fact that he’s taken another life that makes him feel disgusted with himself.

When he first got into smuggling, he promised himself he’d never hurt anyone; but the years have changed him, and now he knows he’s a dead shot with a blaster.

Every death he inflicts repulses him. It’s bad enough when he finds himself in a shootout with Imperials, when he’s firing on ships, or at faceless white-helmeted Stormtroopers, but he saw Greedo’s face, as he shot him in cold blood.

_Greedo would have killed you without a thought,_ he tells himself. _You had to shoot first_.

It’s worse when he finds Penny Peabody waiting for him at the hangar, calling his name up at the ship.

“Jonesy!” she calls in Huttese. “Come out, Jonesy!”

“Right here, Penny,” he says, stepping forwards, hoping that Sweet Pea has the sense to stay aboard the ship. Sweet Pea finds the gangster even more despicable than Jughead does, and their interactions have gone… badly, to say the least.

“Jonesy,” says Penny, turning to him slowly with a ripple of her sluggish form. “Good to see ya! I hear you’ve fried my guy.”

“Next time you want to talk to me,” says Jughead, with a confidence he doesn’t feel, “Talk to me yourself, Penny, don’t send one of these creeps.”

“Jonesy…” Penny drawls, slinging one of her stubby arms around him as if they’re close, as if she has some hold over him. “Poor Greedo was a poor choice to send, I admit. But why haven’t you paid me the money you owe me?”

That’s the trick with Peabody; she gets some hold over you, claims you owe her, and then you’re trapped. You’ll never pay her back, and you’ll either turn old in her service, or die trying.

Jughead was so nearly out; they had enough, him and Sweet Pea, saved up to buy their way out. Neither of them really believed they’d make it, of course, but they talked about it sometimes.

_“I’ll go back to Kashyyyk,”_ said Sweet Pea, one drunken evening. _“See my father, my old friends; and then I reckon I’ll join the Rebels. Been a long time since I fought alongside the right people._ ”

Jughead had no such concrete plans. Freedom seemed a long way away, and when an Imperial cruiser swung into view right before their scheduled spice drop, he’d been almost relieved to have the choice taken from him. He wonders if that wasn’t a coincidence, if Penny had deliberately compromised the run, to keep the crew of the Falcon in her debt.

“You know as well as I do that I had to ditch the spice, or end up in an Imperial prison,” spits Jughead. “It’s running for you, or mining for them. I’ll get you your money, just give me time.”

“Listen, lover boy,” says Penny, and her arm strokes his shoulder, “I shouldn’t make exceptions-”

“I’ve got a nice, easy charter coming up,” interrupts Jughead desperately, although he’s still trying to sound cool, calm, in control. “I’ll pay you back, plus a little extra…”

It won’t give him and Sweet Pea much to restart their lives with, but it’s a start.

“You’re terrific, Jughead,” drawls Penny. “So, for an extra twenty percent-”

“Fifteen,” says Jughead defiantly. He can see Sweet Pea watching from the cockpit, and he owes this to both of them.

Penny stares at him.

“Fifteen, huh,” she says. “I’ll take it. But if you fail me again, I’ll put a price on your head so big, you won’t be able to go near a civilised system.”

“Done,” says Jughead, and Penny slithers off, her slimy form rasping against the stone of the hangar.

The Falcon’s intercom sounds down to the entrance ramp.

_“That slug deserves to rot in the sand,”_ says Sweet Pea fervently. _“Tell me we won’t fuck this up, Jug._ ”

“We won’t,” says Jughead, emphatically, as if he believes it himself. The pessimistic part of him refuses to believe that they won’t find themselves back there, reeled back in even after their insanely lucrative charter to Alderaan.

When the strange desert duo and their droids arrive, Jughead’s making final checks to the Falcon’s underbelly, half-heartedly watching a news holo as he works. The Imperial Senate is being disbanded – big news, as if it wasn’t a toothless relic of a bygone age that too many people viewed with rose-tinted glasses. There’s a proxy war on a mid-Rim planet that’s threatening to spill into other zones – what else is new?

The senator from Alderaan has died in an accident. It sounds suspicious, although the news, predictably, is toeing the Imperial line and describing it as a random tragedy.

Betty Cooper. She was pretty, too young to see the corruption in the Senate and too young to die at the hands of the Empire. Jughead has always watched the proceedings of the Senate with a cynical interest, and he had developed a soft spot for the seemingly innocent, ruthlessly articulate, defiant senator from Alderaan.

He’s surprised by how personally he takes her death, like someone’s kicked him in the chest.

“What a piece of junk!”

That’s the kid, Archie Andrews, gazing at the Falcon in disbelief. He’s wearing a poncho, and the dust of the desert clings to him. He’s wide-eyed, disappointed by the unglamorousness of how his adventure’s turning out.

“She may not look like much, but she’ll get you wherever you want, Archie,” Jughead replies, refusing to lose his temper. “And she’s got it where it counts. But we’re a little rushed for time, so if you’d just like to get on board, and we’ll be underway.”

“Sorry, man, I didn’t mean to insult your ship,” says Archie, and he seems sincere, but Jughead doesn’t much care.

“Sure, Archie,” he says, and gestures to the ramp, where Fred has already boarded. “She makes point five, past lightspeed, so I’ll accept the apology later.”

“Hello, sir,” says a golden protocol droid, waddling towards him. “I am Kevin, cyb-org relations. This is my counterpart, Fangs.”

“Fangs and Kevin,” says Jughead, shaking his head in amusement. “I’d say it’s a pleasure, but I’m afraid we won’t be acquainted very long.”

He turns to check the last of the landing struts. It’s a rule he and Sweet Pea have tried to apply, whenever they smuggle passengers, rather than spice: don’t get involved. They’ve made enough refugee and rebel trips, under Penny’s radar, to know that the rule is worth sticking to. Still, they’re a funny little group. The R2 unit beeps something rude at him, and a smile breaks across Jughead’s face before he can help himself.

“Stop that ship! Blast them!”

Stormtroopers suddenly litter the entrance to the bay, and Jughead’s blaster is in his hand before he’s even really registered it. Two Imps drop dead, and he darts up the entrance ramp, the heat of blaster bolts flaring at his heels.

“Sweet Pea, get us out of here!” he hollers, slamming the main hatch closed. He dashes to the cockpit and hurls himself into the pilot’s seat.

It’s the work of a few seconds to lift off, blasting into the blue skies, and then the starry darkness above Tattooine, where two Imperial Star Destroyers hang, waiting for them.

“Our passengers must be hotter than I thought,” he remarks to Sweet Pea, jamming coordinates into the computer. “How the hell did we end up with this?”

_“I couldn’t refuse a Jedi, Jug._ ”

Before he can unpack the surreal implications of that statement, Archie and Fred appear in the cockpit, and Jughead can barely contain his irritation at their unwanted presence; but he’s too busy trying to make sure they don’t get captured by the Imperials.

_Fuck, fuck,_ he thinks. _I know I didn’t sign up for this. What the hell am I getting involved with?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> han solo is a troubling character but he wears a fine boot, pls imagine jughead in knee high shiny riding boots because I reckon it would completely work
> 
> anyway apologies for the still separate storylines, I promise we'll get there soon but there's so little leia plotline to work with for like hours of this film


	5. an alternative form of persuasion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alderaan, afterwards

Betty is awakened roughly, dragged from a disturbed sleep of horrifying dreams down the cell bay before she can shake herself into some semblance of the functioning human she used to be.

(For the last few hours, her only dreams have been full of pain. Her own, her mother’s, the pain of millions of people that she doesn’t even know is ringing in her ears. She doesn’t know what it means yet, but she knows something is coming. She doesn’t know how she will hold Vader off next time.)

The command centre is strange, with the viewpoint focussing in only one direction. It has no strategic advantage, not like the windows on the bridges of the Star Destroyers that Betty has toured.

She squares her shoulders, and prepares for what she assumes will be the fight of her life.

“Grand Moff Lodge,” she says, facing the familiar little man she remembers from his sneers at endless Imperial functions. “I should have expected to find you holding Vader’s leash. I recognised your foul stench when I was brought on board.”

Lodge smiles vaguely, and cups Betty’s chin. He’d been a thorn in the Rebel senators’ side as long as Betty can remember; a cruel man, apparently cultured and smooth, but ruthless.

 _One day_ , Betty thinks, _if neither of us die in this war, I’ll see you prosecuted for war crimes_.

“Charming, to the last,” says Lodge, and he almost strokes his thumb across Betty’s chin. “You have no idea how hard I found it, signing the order to terminate your life.”

Betty rips her chin out of Lodge’s grasp. It’s true that they were old adversaries, when Betty was still pretending to be the naïve Baby of the Senate, perfect and idealistic and harmless, but there is no point in keeping up that pretence now. 

“I’m surprised you had the courage to take the responsibility yourself,” she spits.

She’s trapped between Lodge and Vader; but Lodge walks away, a satisfied smile on his pleasant face.

“Princess Elizabeth,” he says, and the headache-not-headache that’s been brewing behind Betty’s eyes swells, “Before your execution, I would like you to be my guest at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational. No star system will dare oppose the Emperor now.”

“The more you tighten your grip, Hiram, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.”

It feels good, after all these years, to stop biting her tongue, to say the things that Betty’s always thought. Reticence will do her no good now; and if she can goad him enough (if that would work with a calm, controlled psychopath like Lodge), he might snap, and kill her, and then she can’t betray the Rebellion.

“In a way,” says Lodge coolly, as a familiar, beloved blue-green planet hoves into view on the targeting screen, “You have determined the choice of the planet that will be destroyed first.”

After that, Betty’s mind is screaming too loudly for her to make sense of what is going on.

- _no, Alderaan is peaceful, we have no weapons!-_

_-I grow tired of asking-_

_-Dantooine, they’re on Dantooine-_

_-Vader’s hand pulling her back into his chest, stopping her futile attempt to hurl herself forwards to stop him somehow, to find some way, they can’t really do it, they can’t kill all of those people-_

_no no no no no no_

She remembers her vision of her mother crying as the palace at Aldera burst into green light, and now she knows what she saw.

Pinpricks of pain invade her mind. She thinks she’s screaming, or is that the people of Alderaan, gone in an instant?

She goes limp. She’s vaguely aware of Vader lifting her, carrying her like a child, of her humiliation before Lodge and his command crew of sneering Imperial murderous bastards, but she can’t bring herself to move, or care. Her brain can’t comprehend yet.

On the other side of the galaxy, but drawing closer by the second, an aging Jedi grasps his chest, knowing that something _terrible_ has happened. His youthful student offers his support, as Jughead steers them ever closer to the now-gone planet of Alderaan.

A collision is coming, but all Betty knows is grief.

When Vader dumps her in her cell, he stares at her in fascination.

“We have more than I thought in common,” he says, his voice curious through the vocoder. Betty slumps on her ‘bed’, tears for all the dead she must grieve starting their slow trickle down her face. People she hasn’t thought about in years jump into her head – _the old head gardener, who caught her hiding in the roses; that tutor who’d argued with her endlessly about politics_ – before she can even think about the loss of her mother, the Queen of Alderaan, who didn’t even believe in the monarchy but maintained it to defy the Empire from within.

“What the hell could I have in common with you?” Betty finally manages. “You’re a war criminal. You’re evil. You do the worst of the Emperor’s dirty work, and you think it’s right.”

“I do,” says Vader, sounding vaguely amused. “And yet, there is something inside you that I recognise. Can’t you feel it, Your Highness?”

Betty considers this for a moment. Grief flashes before her eyes, but her mind seems to skitter away, protecting her, and a cool detachment seems to come between the electric bursts of grief.

She never thought she’d be grateful for Vader distracting her by pissing her off, but she literally cannot comprehend the magnitude of what has happened yet.

“I don’t know what you want me to feel, Vader,” she says. “I’ve never condoned mass slaughter. I’ve never willingly enforced Imperial laws that systematically oppress and exploit people.”

“I do not mean that,” says Vader, pityingly, and Betty hates how naïve he thinks she is, hates his condescending assumptions. “You will come to understand in time, Your Highness, that certain decisions are necessary evils that leaders must make to maintain order.”

“Like Alderaan?”

“Exactly.”

“I hope you die burning.”

Vader stiffens, and Betty thinks she’s hit a nerve. He stalks over to her, and looms, as if he might ignite that red lightsaber and put her out of her misery.

Instead, he stands there, gazing at her, mask unreadable as ever.

“I wonder what your life would have been like, before the Empire,” he says enigmatically, and with a swish of his cape, he’s gone.

Betty is alone with her grief.

But grief becomes anger.

If she gets out of here, Betty vows, she will end the fucking Empire or die trying.

After that, she’ll mourn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can i briefly say that i fucking love peter cushing
> 
> i get the vader hype but i just love tarkin in star wars. he's such an over-confident posh english bastard and i root for him to blow up so hard every fucking time. yeah you stay aboard and explode like the imperial you are. he's a superlative villain. he's so well-played, every scene he's in you're like 'you murderous fuck i can't WAIT for the ending' and i think sometimes with the current moral grey-area villain/anti-hero obsession in popular culture we've lost a beautiful thing in compelling villains who you love every scene that they're in but you cannot fucking wait for the comeuppance.
> 
> more importantly also peter cushing did most of the film wearing slippers and had such a good time he was sad not to be able to come back for the sequels
> 
> (no riverdale villain could ever, barring perhaps penelope or bret)
> 
> also baby of the house is an unofficial term in the uk parliament for the youngest MP; the oldest is father of the house and one day we will make them change that although right now the government is trying to kill us all through mishandling pretty much everything so we're going to have to wait a while on the parent of the house


	6. i'm here to rescue you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jughead and Betty meet aboard the Death Star. it's inauspicious, to say the least.

Jughead Jones has not signed up for this.

Okay, against his better judgement, he likes Archie. He’s a sweet kid who means well, and everyone knows Jughead has no love for the Empire. Even Fred’s grown on him, with his harmless cod philosophy and his kindness to Jughead, who has seen very little friendliness over the years, and especially to Sweet Pea, who gets a lot of shit from humans, even Rebel humans, who refuse to listen to Wookiees. 

But that doesn’t mean he’s ready to be hauled aboard an Imperial battle station that can destroy fucking planets. It doesn’t mean he’s ready to fly through the debris of beautiful Alderaan, and it doesn’t mean he’s ready to rescue this Princess, whoever she is.

(No-one mentions that the entitled aristocratic princess is the same brilliant girl who eviscerates the Emperor for his open fascism, demanding radical change. He’s half in love with her before he ever meets her.)

So Archie demands they rescue the Princess Elizabeth, offering Jughead far more money that Archie himself doesn’t even have. Fred has disappeared to disable the tractor beam, and Jughead maintains he doesn’t give a shit, although he’d rather not see the old man dead.

“Jughead, you put those on,” says Archie, backing away after he tries to put the handcuffs on Chewie.

“Jug,” says Chewie. “The Andrews cub means well, but I can’t. You know I can’t.”

“S’okay, Pea,” says Jughead, breaking the cuffs until they can’t go over Sweet Pea’s wrists. He won’t cuff a Wookiee. Sweets has already been through enough, and they can fake cuffs easy enough. “I think I know what he’s up to.”

They’re in the high-security cell bay, Imperial troops dead, when Jughead finds himself faced with dissembling on a scale he’s never been prepared for.

“…uh… Everything’s under control, situation normal,” Jughead blurts, his vague attempts at smoothness sounding terrible even to his own ears. Sweet Pea rolls his eyes expressively.

“ _What happened?”_ the Imp on the other end of the distress call asks.

“Uh, we had a slight… weapons malfunction, but everything’s perfectly alright now, we’re fine, we’re all fine here now, thank you. How are you?”

Jughead knows he’s a fucking idiot the moment the words leave his mouth. The Imperial officer is not convinced.

“ _We’re sending a squad up_.”

“…Uh, negative, negative, we have, uh, a reactor leak here, uh, now. Give us a few minutes to lock it down. Uh, large leak, very dangerous.”

 _“Who is this? What’s your operating number?_ ”

Jughead blasts the communicator. It’s a boring conversation anyway.

“Archie!” he yells. “We’re gonna have company!”

It’s a very short time later when he finds himself up in the walkway of the Death Star’s detention level, confronted with the not-remotely dead Senator Elizabeth Cooper, who is both extremely pretty and absolutely furious with him.

“Looks like you managed to cut off our only escape route!” she snaps, her face flushed with rage and life. Jughead is both in love, and definitely considering shooting her. 

“Maybe you’d like it back in your cell, Your Highness?” he snaps, and they split apart to hide behind the cell bay’s limited cover. Betty goes to duck behind Archie, and an ugly bit of Jughead resents that she doesn’t hide behind him, instead.

The Imperial fire is relentless. Why the hell did they think this would work? Archie is calling to Kevin on the communicator, but while Jughead might have some hope that Fangs, the little astromech droid, would try to help them, Kevin is blatantly not programmed for this.

“This is some rescue!” shouts Betty, repeating Jughead’s own thoughts. “You came in here, did you have a plan for getting out?!”

“He’s the brains, Betty!” snaps Jughead, firing wildly at the Imperials. Archie yelps something, and it dawns on Jughead, yet again, what an idiot he’s been to try and help Archie. Yes, he had a slight crush on Senator Cooper, and Archie Andrew’s enthusiasm is infectious, but now he’s going to die here, and he’s brought Sweet Pea with him. The big Wookiee is hurling Shriiywook expletives at the Imps, and enjoying the battle; but he could’ve avoided it in the first place, if Jughead hadn’t been so easily convinced by Archie and Betty.

Betty Cooper, stunning and brilliant and infuriating, relieves Archie Andrews of his blaster, and blows a hole in the side of the cell bay wall. The heat from the blaster bolts strikes Jughead’s leg, and he almost leaps aside, his purloined Stormtrooper armour useless.

“What the hell are you doing?!” he demands, struck yet again by this girl he’s half in love with but has never met.

“Somebody has to save our skins!” snaps Betty, and leaps across the cell bay, taking out two Stormtroopers as she goes. “Into the garbage chute, flyboy!”

She hurls the blaster back at Archie, and swings herself into the newly-revealed garbage chute. Archie looks completely astonished, his image of the shy damsel in distress who’d fall meekly at his gallant feet completely destroyed.

Sweet Pea goes in next.

“ _It smells like fucking shit!”_ the Wookiee protests. _“You humans and your shitty sense of smell, there’s something down there that reeks like the hindquarters of a Bantha with diahorrea!”_

“Get in there, Sweets, it’ll smell worse if we die!”

“ _You’re an asshole, Jug!”_ roars Sweet Pea, but he swings himself in nonetheless. Archie is firing away at the Imps, but he still looks dumbfounded.

“Wonderful girl!” says Jughead, and he really means it, amused by Archie’s bemusement. “Either I’m going to kill her, or I’m beginning to like her!”

He really means that too. Betty Cooper, object of his distant admiration, is already more wonderful than he’d imagined. If they die here, he’ll feel marginally better just for knowing her for a few minutes.

“Get in there, Arch!” he cries, and Archie, with a look of mild panic, hurls himself headfirst into the garbage chute. Jughead darts out into the cell bay, fires a few more times, and leaps into the chute with a roar of defiance. Surely whatever waits for them in there can’t be worse than death at the hands of some Imperial grunts.

It sure smells worse, though.

The chute gives him a chance to right his posture, and when he lands, he’s feet first, bouncing off a pile of garbage. The sudden silence of the garbage dump strikes him like a slap in the face, after the disorientation of the smoke-filled, echoing cell bay. For a garbage dump, it’s well-lit, and a welcome relief from the dark Imperial corridors.

Betty is scrambling on top of some heap of crap, while Archie flounders in the centre. Some revolting liquid has pooled in the middle of the room, no doubt the result of a few thousand or more Imps occupying this hellish place. Sweets, very sensibly, has used the advantage of his long limbs to clamber out of the garbage and on to the raised area by the door. Well, the rest of them don’t have fur to keep clean, but Jughead is repulsed nonetheless, and his unwilling attraction is about to come out in the worst way possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some people method act to be a horrendous arsehole. harrison ford deliberately didn't learn his lines for the 'how are you scene' so he had genuinely no idea what the fuck to say. THAT'S method.
> 
> no but there are some problems with the ol thing there so maybe don't hype it too much yooooooo exploitation of actresses is HORRIFIC
> 
> anyway they've met and betty is about to learn how to cope with the sheer beauty of jughead jones
> 
> but not to be overdramatic but to several things that happened this week WHAT THE FUCK
> 
> I'M NEVER GETTING MORE OF AN ONLINE PRESENCE
> 
> THERE HAVE BEEN SOME THINGS THIS WEEK IN THIS FANDOM.


End file.
